


April is the Cruellest Month

by Albione



Series: Traviamento [4]
Category: Call Me By Your Name (2017), Call Me By Your Name - All Media Types, Call Me by Your Name - André Aciman
Genre: Angst, Death of a Relative, M/M, Oliver and Elio meet in New York, Small Hope
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 07:04:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18544720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Albione/pseuds/Albione
Summary: Terrible news brings Elio and Oliver closer once more.





	April is the Cruellest Month

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry for the delay in posting, life has dealt me a hard blow and I am picking up the pieces. When I wrote this chapter I did not suppose that it would be so cruelly close to me.

As soon as Oliver heard the news, he wrote to Annella.  
Of course, the number of discarded drafts crumpled into his wastepaper basket, meant it was not as soon as he had wanted.

The thought of no Pro somewhere on Earth was just unbearable; that feeling was the one that propelled him to post the letter to a woman, a widow, he had not heard from for nearly ten years.  
As a cliff slowly crumbling into the angry ocean waters, he was losing all that had been good and just in his life. 

The letter that came back a few weeks later did not surprise him; he knew that Annella would personally thank everyone, but as he looked at the handwriting on the envelope, he know it was not Annella.  
He trembled as he opened the letter.

“Dear Oliver,  
It has been a long time, but the distance of years did not lessen the comfort my mother and I felt reading your kind words about father.  
It has been hard, but we are slowly finding our way around a world without him.  
I have a favour to ask you, I understand if it is impossible for you to grant it.  
I will be in New York on the 15th of April, and I would like to meet up if you can manage to be there.  
Hoping to hear from you soon.  
Elio”

Oliver just stared at the words; Elio wanted to see him; after that meeting years ago he had been sure that the memory of that back slowly walking away would be the last memory of his cor cordium. He quickly replied.  
\----

The hotel was understated luxury, the slight shabbiness was due to age and comfort, not neglect. It reminded Oliver of the villa, full of beauty used in daily life, not placed into cabinets to admire.  
Elio was becoming well known in the music world, he had won the Chopin competition and had recorded a selection of concertos, but he had hinted that composition was his real interest in the last interview Oliver had read.  
Yes, Oliver had been keeping up with Elio’s career; each time he looked at the photos of the brilliant young pianist, he looked for traces of the young man he knew a lifetime ago.

He never found them in the serious expression, the chiseled cheekbones and messy curly hair. Only the long nervous fingers he could recognise, fingers that had buried themselves deep into Oliver’s skin and hair.

Oliver saw Elio sitting in an armchair too large for him; his slender frame was folded upon itself, Oliver was afraid to approach till when Elio saw him, and waved him over.  
“Thank you for coming Oliver, I really do appreciate it. You were the only person I could think of being with me for this.” Elio looked at his feet, trying to find the energy for getting up.  
Oliver without thinking offered his hand; Elio took it and leaverhed himself up.  
With their faces so close, they both stared at each other, searching for traces of time, changes or reassurance that all was the same.

“Where are we going?” The question was simple but Oliver hoped the answer would be complex as a life entwined.  
“I wanted to walk along the Hudson and I will know the right place when I see it.” 

The afternoon was warm, all the shades of green were present around them; they walked in silence, a comforting silence based on shared sorrow.  
Elio stopped as the sun was setting, he slumped against the railing clutching the handrail till the skin of his knuckles was transparent.

“Here, I think this is the right place…” The voice was so soft that Oliver wasn't certain he had heard.  
“Father used to tell me that as a child he liked watching the big ships dock, he wondered from where they had come from, the treasures they contained…”  
They both looked at the crumbling pier, the broken windows of the warehouses and the weeds claiming back the site that man had discarded.  
Elio slowly took out a small box from his backpack, his hands were trembling but he was so reverently careful that the box was almost still in his grasp.

Oliver wanted to steady him, place a hand on his shoulder or frame Elio’s hands, but he kept back; he felt he was witnessing something so intimate, he felt an intruder.  
Elio opened the box, it contained a small amount of grey dust.  
“I promised I would take part of you back to your childhood home dad!”  
Leaning over the railing he carefully emptied the box into the river below.

In the twilight Oliver saw powder dancing, swirling, blowing away down the river or just landing on the waters.  
He saw Pro smiling in the study at the villa, his eyes full of wonder looking at the slides of Classical statues.

He could not help himself, he crushed Elio into an embrace, resting his chin on the top of windswept curls.  
He heard the box falling to the ground and felt Elio’s hands on his back, clutching his jacket tightly.  
If the world ended in that moment, if Earth became an eternal sunless planet, Oliver would not despair.

How long the stood embraced was not clear to either of them; Elio was the first to pull back.  
“Thank you Oliver for being here, father was so fond of you…”  
“Thank YOU for letting me be here Elio…”  
They stood looking at each other, they had so much to say but neither knew where to start and both were afraid of words, that they could break the spell.

All the the shades of green, all the life around them was muted into indigo as Nyx claimed her kingdom.


End file.
